FTA: "You look at the map, you tap your intended destination, and the map will draw your route, including any transfers along the way. It's an interface that puts Google Maps to shame."

I should hope so, what with the whole "well-defined rail route in an area the size of... NYC." Next up, an interactive map of Coney Island that tells you how to get from point A to point B better than Google Maps.

I'm not a pants shiatting pussy. If it's covered with something I don't want to touch, I don't touch it. Otherwise it's just my finger. I can go ten minutes without poking myself in my eye with my finger, subby.

/never been on a subway//almost never been in a city with a subway///but I watch those home made movies on the internet so I know what goes on there

Yeah, if you've touched a doorknob or a handrail in a public building, you've touched the same stuff as whatever's on the subway. People are just pansies about it. Your immune system is like a muscle, you gotta give it some exercise sometimes.

davidphogan:I'm not a pants shiatting pussy. If it's covered with something I don't want to touch, I don't touch it. Otherwise it's just my finger. I can go ten minutes without poking myself in my eye with my finger, subby.

/never been on a subway//almost never been in a city with a subway///but I watch those home made movies on the internet so I know what goes on there

Yeah, if you've touched a doorknob or a handrail in a public building, you've touched the same stuff as whatever's on the subway. People are just pansies about it. Your immune system is like a muscle, you gotta give it some exercise sometimes.

davidphogan:I'm not a pants shiatting pussy. If it's covered with something I don't want to touch, I don't touch it. Otherwise it's just my finger. I can go ten minutes without poking myself in my eye with my finger, subby.

I like the part where platforms will have wifi. The rest is a colossal waste of money.

I predict the pilot rollout will be cancelled after the first batch of machines are all rendered unusable by graffiti taggers with glass etching acid. But the MTA will still pay for it, and fares will be raised to $2.50 before 2015.

poot_rootbeer:I like the part where platforms will have wifi. The rest is a colossal waste of money.

I predict the pilot rollout will be cancelled after the first batch of machines are all rendered unusable by graffiti taggers with glass etching acid. But the MTA will still pay for it, and fares will be raised to $2.50 before 2015.

poot_rootbeer:But the MTA will still pay for it, and fares will be raised to $2.50 before 2015.

It's already $2.50. The fare hike kicked in this month, and there's been a 2015 fare hike in the MTA's plans since around 2009.

Which is as it should be. Like all mass transit systems, MTA is subsidized to the eyeballs by people who have neither the need nor the inclination for it, nor do they benefit from it even indirectly because the number of users is small compared to the general population. I live over 100 miles away from the city and 25 miles from the nearest Metro North station, but I'm getting farked with somewhere between six and nine different taxes that fund the MTA. There's MTA taxes attached to my phone bill, my mortgage payment, the sales tax, surcharges on vehicle registrations, and my MTA payroll tax alone has been around $300/yr (although the tax was recently revised to not bone me in the ear quite so thoroughly) for something only used by a handful of commuters in my county.

Gulper Eel:I live over 100 miles away from the city and 25 miles from the nearest Metro North station, but I'm getting farked with somewhere between six and nine different taxes that fund the MTA. There's MTA taxes attached to my phone bill, my mortgage payment, the sales tax, surcharges on vehicle registrations, and my MTA payroll tax alone has been around $300/yr (although the tax was recently revised to not bone me in the ear quite so thoroughly) for something only used by a handful of commuters in my county.

Even as a big Metro-North fan I agree that Dutchess and Orange counties get boned on the MTA taxes. It definitely should be pro-rated somewhat.

Gulper Eel:poot_rootbeer: But the MTA will still pay for it, and fares will be raised to $2.50 before 2015.

It's already $2.50. The fare hike kicked in this month, and there's been a 2015 fare hike in the MTA's plans since around 2009.

Which is as it should be. Like all mass transit systems, MTA is subsidized to the eyeballs by people who have neither the need nor the inclination for it, nor do they benefit from it even indirectly because the number of users is small compared to the general population. I live over 100 miles away from the city and 25 miles from the nearest Metro North station, but I'm getting farked with somewhere between six and nine different taxes that fund the MTA. There's MTA taxes attached to my phone bill, my mortgage payment, the sales tax, surcharges on vehicle registrations, and my MTA payroll tax alone has been around $300/yr (although the tax was recently revised to not bone me in the ear quite so thoroughly) for something only used by a handful of commuters in my county.

You are subsidizing an urban center that in turn generates massive tax revenue for the state.

/never been on a subway//almost never been in a city with a subway///but I watch those home made movies on the internet so I know what goes on there

Yeah, if you've touched a doorknob or a handrail in a public building, you've touched the same stuff as whatever's on the subway. People are just pansies about it. Your immune system is like a muscle, you gotta give it some exercise sometimes.

So, bareback once a month?

Unless you want a drug resistant bacterium to feast on your weak immune system the way piranha feast on prey that fall to the water, I'd suggest you let your body come out and play once in a while.

DB:You are subsidizing an urban center that in turn generates massive tax revenue for the state.

City residents and businesses paid about $4.1 billion more to Albany in taxes and fees than the state returned in spending for education, health care, transit and other services in 2009-10. For the nearby suburban counties (Nassau, Suffolk, Rockland and Westchester), it was $7.9 billion more in taxes than came back in spending.

That would be Wall Street doing the subsidizing, not NYC as a whole. Income taxes from Wall Street are about 14% of the state's tax revenue. About $8 billion, iirc. That's just income taxes, and not the other taxes Wall Street pays, like the stock transfer tax which pulled in another $14b.

It sure as shiat isn't the Bronx or Bensonhurst subsidizing me. Pretty much every single New Yorker who works outside the top end of the financial or entertainment industries is a moocher.